So your friends are accidentally on purpose having children, giving each other rings, and doing beautiful, real, rewarding things. This is why you're not.

Maybe you're like me, in your late 20s and starting to feel like you're in the autumn of your life. Okay maybe not autumn, but summer is definitely getting colder. The drug-taking and regular, baggage-free sex is slowing down, but we're also not dead so that's nice. Friends are starting to accidentally-on-purpose have children, give each other rings, and do beautiful, real, rewarding things together. And there you are: in bed on a Saturday at 4PM in yesterday's underwear, watching Netflix, texting your housemate to open the door for your Menulog guy because you can't bring yourself to go out there.

I ward off those confused, jealous, self-pitying pangs when a friend reaches a milestone that's light-years ahead of me by reminding myself milestones are forever. This goes especially for kids. You can't divorce kids for a dude you met in Belize.

To be clear, my friends' children are beautiful, and when they fall asleep in my arms I feel like the chaotic nature of existence makes a tiny bit of sense—but there's a lot of fuckedness ahead for parents. How do you know your kid won't be an asshole? And what if they get pregnant at 15 and you're a grandparent at 40? I find keeping that stuff in the forefront of your mind gets you through. Along with a few other thoughts.

Sometimes I'll pass myself in the mirror and just be like, hmm, you again. Or sometimes I'll go to say something and I'll basically just say the exact opposite of what a cool person would say. Your kid is going to constantly remind you of yourself. Every time it does something dumb you'll be like, arg I do that. I am awful. Why did I create life?

Your Kid Will Get Really Into Things You Ruined for Yourself a Long Time Ago

My friend's kid was so into Man In The Mirror at one point he was listening to it in the car like upwards of five times a day. If that's what parenting is then count me the fuck out. I kill things for myself enough. If I ever have to listen to Shake It Off as some kind of throwback on the way to kindergarten, I will drive that car into a tree. I do not care.

I wish with all of my heart that I had made this up, but right now, out there, there is a kid called KVIIIlyn. I realize that doesn't look like a word and that's because it isn't one. But someone called their child this and—get this—it's Kaitlyn spelled with roman numerals. That's a real person. I know because I saw it on a Facebook yummy mummy group.

I am not even joking. These people are out there and you will be dealing with them on a daily basis. KVIIIlyn's mum will be calling you to organise carpools and fete stall duties. You will be forced to wait for your kids out the front of school together while she tells you about last night's episode of House Husbands and what she's cooking for dinner and you'll be thinking, I was supposed to be a rockstar.

This is the thing that scares me the most. Sure, most people don't become Big Brother contestants. I didn't, my friends didn't, and nobody I know did. But that doesn't mean anything. Anyone can do it. Your kid might grow up to be a complete dickhead, you don't know. He might start hanging out with dropkicks at school, smoking ciggies in the bathroom during SOSE, flipping off regular people on the street for no reason and doing whatever kind of psychotropic, Total Recall-type drug they'll be doing by then that ruins your life instantly.

And then it's 2035. He's old enough to apply for uni but all he's thinking about is popularity and hosting late night game shows and getting his dick wet so he applies to Big Brother instead and gets in because—let's face it—you raised him and he's actually alright, but it's too late and there's nothing you can do now. Your kid's going on TV, finger-blasting strangers in a Queensland lap pool and crying in the Diary Room because he's finally realised he doesn't like himself. He's voted out, and now he's unemployable, sleeping on your couch indefinitely. You're basically living with Hotdogs.

If it's not Big Brother it's something else— X Factor, Masterchef, The Bachelor. There are a lot f these. Do not underestimate your child's ability to humiliate themselves on national TV.

You probably will, but you may not. I have it on good authority that sex falls by the wayside after children because they suck every sexual impulse you've ever had out through your nipples like a dementor. Except instead of kissing you they throw their dinner on the floor every night and sleep in between you and your partner 'til they're eight. We've all seen Judd Apatow movies, don't act like you don't know.

One Day Your Kid Will Ask for Adidas Shell Toes and When You Try to Buy Them For Her, They Won't Have Them in Her Size So She'll Throw a Tantrum and Tell You to Go Fuck Yourself